


The Crickets Have Arthritis

by infinityuphigh



Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2012-05-30
Updated: 2012-12-02
Packaged: 2017-11-06 06:52:33
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 7
Words: 12,942
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/416007
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/infinityuphigh/pseuds/infinityuphigh
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>An AU based off of the novel "Johnny Got His Gun" by Dalton Trumbo, although if you haven't read the book, this still will not be a problem to understand. An insight into what would happen inside the mind of Sherlock Holmes were he to really experience a great Fall, and as a consequence be trapped within himself. Third person, Sherlock-centric, spoilers for, well, everything.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Alright, so before this starts, I would like to make a few credits. One goes to, of course, Dalton Trumbo for his wonderful novel which inspired the whole ordeal. I do not claim credit for any of the genius that may or may not transpire. Second, I credit the wonderful poet Shane Koyczan, whose brilliant poem serves as the title of this piece. Third, to my beta, Emily, because she's absolutely lovely and smart and talented and puts up with all of this crap.
> 
> The installments will be made every week, as this story is nearly all written down in my handy-dandy notebook.

When Sherlock wakes up, he hears the phone ringing. Ringing. Ringing. Why won’t anyone pick up that damn phone? He’s in the flat, solving a case from the comfort of his bed sheets (the beauty of technology) and the phone is ringing? Maybe the doorbell? Who knows, and he’s half asleep, sedated, and the sound is incessant, that god forsaken noise. Why won’t people just leave him alone? The sound crowds his head and makes it hot, makes all of his thoughts flounder wildly about, trying to find space, peace, comfort, solitude, but they can’t and these crowded thoughts get angry and they create more thoughts, his head is spinning, everything is warm so warm and he’s on fire and

Ring. Ring.

Sherlock is on the roof of the hospital, and he’s holding his mobile to his ear.

Ring. Ring. Ring. So calculated. Calm. Indifferent. The noise holds absolutely no tinges of urgency or panic or guilt or defeat or

“Sherlock?”

John. John, John, John. John’s voice is a cold sweep of air that subdues all of the fire in Sherlock’s brain.

He doesn’t feel anything when he says the words, he only feels his façade break and the rivulets of tears inch down from his eyes.

“I guess this is my note.”

Sherlock has lived one million years in this scene, feeling it tear him apart while he watches it from one hundred miles up.

An out of body experience. Interesting.

And John is shaking his head; he doesn’t believe it, doesn’t believe that this can happen to him again, not after everything he’s lived through, please god, not this and –

Won’t someone please pick up the goddamn phone?

Sherlock falls. He falls, and he thinks, this is all for you, John, for us. The whistle in the wind is the last thing he hears before _it_ , before the Big Bang, the end of the world.

Crack. Well, that can’t be good. But what comes after the Fall? He thinks. Everything is cold and black, and he can’t see anything, can’t see the white light, the holy angels welcoming him to Heaven. Alternatively, the fiery gates to Hell aren’t anywhere in sight, either, so that’s a good sign.

Then what?

You’re the genius here, Sherlock, a nagging voice in his head says. The voice sounds suspiciously like Mycroft, and he cringes.

Make a deduction, Sherlock.

The detective sucks in an exasperated breath of air, feels it fill up his lungs as his mind gets ready for the charge.

Wait a minute – he feels it. Yes. So, not dead then. Dead men do not feel, and they definitely do not think, either. Then what is he? _Where_ is he? Gears start turning and clicking and sparking in his head, and the not knowing is what kills him but it’s what keeps him going all at the same time – the chase, the hunt, the heat, and eventually the kill.

He feels the air through his lungs. Good, still has those. He stretches the feeling, then, carefully, as if thin fingers of light reaching towards the edge of the shadows, to the end of the world, or perhaps just to the end of his toes.

There’s something there, covering him. A sheet? Thin fabric, cool, the cover extending all along his body except where it’s stopped at the middle of his torso. Yes, a sheet, obviously.

Sherlock sighs again. He’s in a hospital, why didn’t he figure that out sooner?

He tries to move his fingers, and realizes that he can’t. He pushes harder and harder against the boundaries of his feeble consciousness, wills the small phalanges to move, to twitch, to do anything. He remains still, though, deathly still, but he’s not dead, right? No, he can’t be, he still has fingers. Fingers that can’t move, that he can feel but _not move_ , how utterly ridiculous, he thinks, and the shrill panic begins to set in, a film of sweat forming on his brow. This sheet is too hot now, he says to himself, and he tries to kick it off, to flail and yell and punch the air, but he can’t, he can’t move anything, not even an inch, which means that he’s –

Paralyzed. Is this a joke? He thinks angrily, some kind of mind trick? Goodness knows that his mind has been tricked once before (once, count it, once _only_ ) so therefore the possibility of it happening again is…

“Wrong, Sherlock. You’re wrong.”

What?  
“You’re wrong and I’m right.”

Mycroft again. He’s shorter now. Taller than Sherlock, though, and the younger Holmes has to squint the sun out of his eyes to be able to see his brother properly. The light surrounds Mycroft like a halo, like a damned holy _thing_ , and Sherlock swells with an infantile frustration.

“No! You’re stupid, Mycroft!” Infantile. Child-like. Yes, Sherlock is a child now, just a little boy, and Big Brother has offered to help him with his coursework after finding him sitting on the lawn, banging his head against the ground in a steady rhythm.

“Sherlock, you’ve got this wrong because the _Earth_ revolves around the _sun_ , we’re not the center of the solar system.”

The younger boy groans loudly, “No, no, _no,_ that doesn’t make any _sense_ , why would that be true if people always say that the sun ‘rises’ or ‘sets’?” Mycroft laughs, attempting to mask the tension in his voice.

“I…that’s just a figure of speech, I mean, it’s not actually true…”

Sherlock yells, then, his thin voice piercing the air, perforating the frail bubble of normalcy that had surrounded them. He was always like this as a child in school, always tortured by the things he couldn’t grasp, the little social things that always seeped into the educational material, contaminated all that was once pure and scientific, making it questions of _ethics_ rather than of x and y, of what do _you_ think instead of a surefire _this is the answer_.

Sherlock hates astronomy the most, because the universe seems so big. Gigantic. Gargantuan. He can think of ten thousand ways to list how big the universe is, but no matter what, he will never know its exact measurements. He will never know how many stars there are or how many planets or if there are other forms of life.

The yelling escalates. The light becomes brighter, a malicious yellow rather than benevolent white, ripping into his pupils, stabbing his brain. His head pulsates and if there are 982,732,935 stars in the universe, how many years, approximately, would it take for them all to burn out? If it takes one rocket ship to fly to the moon, how many for three moons, or five or ten? If space is measured in light years rather than in miles, how many billions of miles away is Mars? Most importantly, though, why the bloody hell would people say that the sun rises or sets when it doesn’t, actually, and it’s just the Earth rotating around it at the rate of ____ per second?

Sherlock shrieks “Why would people say it if it isn’t true?”

The boy can barely hear his brother outside of the cacophony of his own mind, and Mycroft is shouting, “Help mummy help Sherlock’s having an episode Daddy Mum I can’t stop him please help”. The neighbors come to watch but they don’t offer anything, never offer anything because oh that Holmes family oh those young boys they’re geniuses aren’t they well the older one see he’s going to grow up big and strong and successful but the younger well he’s a bit odd you know, a bit strange in the head. They all whisper among themselves, vultures, spreading an ominous shadow all over the street where Sherlock would walk, he has tantrums, you know, suffering under the weight of that big brain of his. How big is it? The children would ask each other, pointing, staring, laughing, is it bigger than the whole universe?

Sherlock feels water, feels it drench his skin and mat his hair. He hears the sizzle of his steaming thoughts as they begin to slow down, to become a little less loud; manageable, even. He blinks several times, his chest heaving, and the daylight looks much kinder now, friendly, and the exuberant greenery upon which he lay seems to shimmer, the droplets on the grass winking slowly as if to say it’s alright now, child, the threat is gone.

He looks up at Mycroft holding half a pail of water, and Mycroft is crying, holding his brother’s hand and saying I’m sorry I’m sorry I’m sorry Sherlock I shouldn’t have said anything please forgive me please be alright.

It’s only then that Sherlock notices the blood timidly trickling down his temple and it feels nice, pleasantly warm, and perhaps he had hit his head a little too hard on the ground while trying to find the answer, the answer to the ultimate question Mummy how big is the universe? It doesn’t matter Sherlock dearest, nothing else matters except that you’re here right now on Earth and not out there in the universe however big it may be now hush darling save your strength they’re coming soon now and you’re going to be alright I promise…

And Sherlock hears the ambulance bell ringing, ringing…

And then nothing. Everything is silent, and although Sherlock strains to listen, all he can grasp is a muffled buzzing, the loudest kind of silence. He still can’t move his fingers, his toes, can’t open his eyes or stretch his tired limbs.

But he can’t hear, either. Not the shuffling of feet or the lights above him or the beeping of the monitors. He can’t hear anything, and that is enough to send his brain right back to where it had started, in the eye of a vicious internal storm.

The darkness in which he is engulfed dims impossibly, and the detective figures that he is still alert enough to realize that he is passing out.

 


	2. Chapter 2

When he dreams, he dreams of Baker Street - where the flat is, where his home is, in central London which is always teeming with life and activity, swelling and sighing and breathing with all of the people. London lives, has always lived, as Sherlock himself does; quick to frenzy, slow to sleep, and always two steps away from a crime scene. It’s Sherlock’s belief that over the years, he has become the human manifestation of the city, all of its excited and manic and insurmountable energy bound within his thin frame.

The theory would certainly explain a lot of things about his head.

Baker Street is different, though – specifically the apartment 221B. The flat where Sherlock lives is a quiet sanctuary away from the chaos that is London, only disturbed periodically by timid clients or the occasional relapse (not recently, though, no time, would only dissuade or hinder future business). The rooms themselves, the colors, the furniture, the stacks of books that he’s never read, they all seem to create a peaceful ambiance that nothing can penetrate.

Wait, he thinks suddenly. Sherlock looks around the flat carefully and his eyes are itching to see something, something he can’t quite place his finger on, but something that’s missing all the same.

Baker Street remains silent, guilty. Then, Baker Street is under water.

It’s strange, because to Sherlock, everything only looks and feels as if it’s under water – that is to say, he can breathe fine. Sure, his movements are sluggish and his vision is obstructed in quite an obnoxious manner, but it’s manageable. Thus far, everything about his condition is manageable.

Then, he sees something, something significant; a gleam, maybe a spark or a shimmer in the upstairs bedroom which is (upon closer inspection) a person, a person with their eyes closed, chest unmoving, entrails, Sherlock assumes, completely submerged. The detective moves in, slowly, slowly. He’s maybe three yards away now. The figure seems to glow faintly, fainter every second as if a light bulb, a star flickering out after a long and exhausted life.

But it’s still just a human. A bone and flesh conductor of light. Such a brilliant, larger-than-life meaning inside of such a simple, ordinary medium, the human itself designed simply as a façade. It’s genius, Sherlock thinks, and he’s only a few feet now and he really must get a better look at this, it’s all fascinating, invigorating, stimulating –

John. Captain John Watson formerly of the fifth Northumberland Fusiliers. This is John his John and how could he forget how could he be so stupid to think that anything else had any meaning? John, Sherlock thinks, and he tries to yell tries to run but the water water everywhere it muffles his shouts and slows him down and John oh god John no please be alive John you’re the reason I did this if you die then I’ve got nothing John no please be living.

A current starts and pushes Sherlock back, and he tries desperately to claw his way along the floor, to fight it, but he can’t and John His John is swept away from him and there’s a ninety eight point seven percent chance that he is dead and that Sherlock will never see him again.

I couldn’t save him, he thinks bitterly, and although nothing comes out and no one can hear him he screams until his lungs burn and the water doesn’t help he chokes on it no it only makes him more furious. I couldn’t save him, Sherlock yells, I tried my hardest but my John is dead and it’s my fault and he will never live the life he should have or get married or have a dog and a house a dull ordinary terrible _boring_ life like he had always wanted someday.

Sherlock wrecks the flat slowly and surely, all of his violent movements delayed and achingly tedious. It’s all my fault, he thinks, John I’m sorry I’m sorry that I lied and that I never got the milk and I’m sorry I’ve ruined all your dates and never told you how much you meant to me. I’m sorry Mycroft and Moriarty kidnapped you and put guns to your head and I’m sorry I couldn’t save you but mostly I’m sorry that you’ll never get to hear any of this because you’re dead and I’m nearly there as well and it isn’t feasible to assume that we will ever cross paths again.

I’m sorry my goodbye was so inadequate, he thinks, and by the time the flat drains and is no longer under water but merely dripping with the horrible remnants of the memories and apologies, Sherlock is too weak to do anything but sit and stare and listen to the bustling London traffic. I’m sorry you stepped off of one battlefield right onto another and that you were too good to make it out in one piece.

For the second time since childhood, Sherlock cries; deep, shaking sobs rack his body and his brain seems to shut off. His sobs are so intense as to render that big mind of his utterly useless; great and ugly enough to knock the life right out of him.

John, he thinks, and that’s all.

Can you hear me?

Listen.

I’m sorry.

Sherlock, in his abounding misery, nearly floods the damn place all over again.

Ultimately, though, he doesn’t.

*

The detective wakes up again in order to realize that he had been subject to a nightmare. A bad dream Mummy help there’s a monster in my closet. Don’t be scared, sweetie. Ordinary. Fascinating. Being at the mercy of the most basic and utterly idiotic, intrinsically human thing: fear. Fear of the unreal, of the irrational. No matter how much Sherlock loathes it, he must marvel at it because it is not often that he can properly relate to those around him, to truly understand feelings rather than simple biology or logic.

So, there’s still a possibility, a probability that John is alive, out there somewhere, worrying wondering wishing waiting god why did you do it Sherlock what could have made this okay? But even if he is alive, there is still no guarantee of ever seeing him, hearing him, feeling the warmth of his proximity. Not if Sherlock continues to be trapped in this waking hell.

Sherlock remembers John’s nightmares. Not that he could actually experience them and remember them in a conventional sense, but he does remember, even if John doesn’t, remembers the hollers and the thrashing and the oh god please not another one no more guns no more dammit there’s no more room no room for the bodies or the blood or the bullets or the pain. Sherlock remembers his friend’s face contorting into horrible grimaces, twisted frowns, experiencing labored breathing, dreaming in a way that only a soldier can; living a fantasy so terrible that no matter how bad it was, reality is still always better, an alleviation of the Weight. At least in reality he can control himself properly.

Those dreams happen when they just move in together, SherlockAndJohn, the Baker Street Duo, the first and only thing that Sherlock is a part of and it is broken in a bad way right from the start.

Sherlock couldn’t help with those. How could he? He knew nothing of the war, nothing of the situation, it simply wasn’t his place. It was never his place. That is, until Moriarty.

Sherlock remembers nights in which he would see John whimpering, cowering from the sheets that engulf him, with that unholy name on his lips and Stop no please. And Sherlock, Sherlock knows about this so Sherlock climbs in with his friend and uses his sleeve to wipe the sweat off his brow and says John it’s alright I’m here he’s not getting in John this is irrational and Mycroft watches over us. John, he chides with the doctor’s head in his lap, stroking his hair, John it’s okay you’re okay is that what you want to hear? But all Sherlock can hear from his flatmate is a weak and terrified utterance of a name –

Jim Moriarty.

Hi.

Jim is the tide that washes away the letters on the beach carved in the sand, the shells, the fine specimens of life, the castles and kings. Jim is the current that carries away all of the good, that took John away into the depths of _wherever_ , that swept Sherlock all the way in the opposite direction and off of a building and through this life and so far into the next that he surpassed it and now he’s here in a terrible purgatory, too alive to be dead but too dead to truly be alive.

“Falling is just like flying, except there’s a more permanent destination.” Jim is the lucky one, Sherlock thinks. At least he’s dead. At least there is a 0.00023 percent chance that even if the bullet missed his brain, the amount of blood would have made sure that he wouldn’t live to rule any longer, wouldn’t be in pain, wouldn’t be so _bored_.

“Honey, you should see me in a crown.”

Jim Moriarty. He’s not everywhere. He’s not all-powerful. The crown jewels and Penton Ville prison, the fake computer code and all the money in the world, these things are not nearly as valuable as the entity that can gain him access to all four:

The poison. The stealthy vignettes. The way he can slither his way into anyone’s head, and the way that he’s in Sherlock’s head now, even after his death.

The immortality of an arch nemesis can really ruin a person’s day.

The colors fade out again. Jim’s face drains and recedes into the dark which signifies full consciousness, and it is in this way that Sherlock realizes with horror that he can no longer distinguish between being asleep and being awake.

Not so much an ordinary problem, no, but mortifying and terrible all the same.

 


	3. Chapter 3

Someone is in the room with him.

It's not a threatening presence, of that much he is certain; whoever it is has a soft vibration emanating from their footsteps, hesitant, sensitive. Sherlock knows this because he has been straining everything he has left at his disposal in order to try and figure out if the world that he once knew was even still turning.

Footsteps. Glorious, non-threatening footsteps, how utterly brilliant, how his heart soars at the wary reverberations.

Come closer, he says shouts yells begs. How long has it been? How long since the Fall, since the trial since Jim and John and Mycroft and the breakfast I had that morning?

Who are you? He pleads with the stranger. Do I know you, are you a friend, are you John or Lestrade or Mrs. Hudson?

Sherlock's mind is in overdrive now – he had always taken time for granted it seems, especially if he's going by how he is struggling to grasp it now. He thinks fervently What's the date What year is it How much rain has fallen over London, made it glisten enticingly for another poor soul since the last time I saw it?

Who are you?

If he could hear the monitor which he feels hooked up to his arms, he is certain that it would be amplifying the wild fluttering of his pulse like some sort of desperate caged bird attempting to escape the thin wiring of his chest. He thinks What if it's John? No, footsteps too frail, it can't be. Mycroft? No doubt that he'll be trying to cover up whatever mess his little brother their playmate had created – no time to visit.

Then who? Or worse yet, what if it's none of them? What if he's been captured by one of Moriarty's men, kept alive and breathing only to be tortured and tossed around and played with and burned and broken and

Sherlock suddenly feels a hand on his own – soft, tentative. A certain perfume permeates his senses. A woman. He feels long hair drape itself over him and quivering lips touch his forehead, talking, murmuring something that he can't hear.

With all of his energy, all of his pent up and misused nerves, he tries to read the words as they are engraved into his skin.

I'm sorry, they proclaim.

No, he realizes, this isn't just any woman. It's Molly, Molly Hooper, the most important woman in the universe.

Molly, he laughs, giddy, actually _giddy_ with relief, Molly you stupid daft naïve girl, why would you be sorry? It's me, he says, me who should be apologizing, it's me who brought you into this mess me who didn't realize how special you are and how much you mean to the world. It's you who saved me, Molly, Sherlock laments silently, and for that I owe you an endless debt of gratitude. Forgive me, he implores, I'm sorry, Merry Christmas Molly Hooper.

She lifts her head from his and she remains very still, although Sherlock struggles to ascertain why. What would she be doing? Making a grand apology, crying over him, blaming herself for his untimely demise?

Please, Sherlock scoffs bitterly, don't be silly. I'm not worth crying over I'm not worth an apology, not like this. Sentiment is an element found only on the losing side and I am the ultimate proof no I won't be worth a dime or a second until I can snap out of this until I can untangle Moriarty's web until I can look John in the eyes until my feet treat the unforgiving London pavement –

Sherlock feels the cords in his arms pull, feels his limbs moving without his consent. It's degrading, he thinks with fury, it's absolutely deplorable that a man with so much control over his mind, over other people's minds, over science and Anderson and maybe all of London's homeless population doesn't even control the movements in his own arms. He tries again to do something, _anything,_ to move his fingers or toes or face but he can't he can't tell Molly to be more careful or she'll miss a vein god knows she's not working in her comfort zone (the morgue) and the consequences could be dire should she mess up. He can't say _please_ don't let your _feelings_ get the better of you because don't be ridiculous this isn't your fault and slow and steady and it's not a race _no rush_.

Everything stops.

Oh, he thinks suddenly. It's not a race. It's not? But what if it is? He feels his thoughts begin to circle each other menacingly, begin to heat up and gain speed and constrict his airways if only slightly. Molly Hooper, the soft spoken Queen of the Dead was here doing what, dropping by for a nice visit, oh Sherlock I'm sorry I brought you some flowers, get well soon?

No. She is fiddling with equipment, examining him, changing a blood bag, possibly. She is taking care of him and her movements are hurried, frantic, although somewhat controlled. She didn't come to cry and mourn at Sherlock's side as he had foolishly expected; she had come to keep him alive in the most effective way she possibly can, and she is in the middle of a war and there's not time to cry right now.

A battle has started, Sherlock realizes, started the second his body hit the ground, and how could he have been so _stupid_?

Come on, he says to himself, come on genius, what's going on now, what have you done? The meager remains of his senses kick into high gear and oh god how he's missed this.

The sheets are still in the same place as when he first woke up, so, safe to assume that not an incredible amount of time has elapsed – if Molly is the one taking care of him, it hasn't been any longer than a week. The air on his skin feels dank, more than a trifle unpleasant, so, not in any top notch hospital thus he's being kept away somewhere thus no more than a handful of people know of his whereabouts thus there is a ninety-nine point nine-eight percent chance that he is legally dead.

An uplifting thought, to be sure.

Molly is taking care of him, and that's an important fact – it's important because he knows Molly and if it were up to her, then she would be at Sherlock's side every second of every day, trying to snap him out of this, trying to do everything in her power to fix a catastrophe that she didn't create.

Typical.

But this is the first time that she's been in the room – something is preventing her from coming, preventing her from being away from Bart's so long as to arouse suspicion.

An unfamiliar, horrible, utterly _sentimental_ lump forms in his throat at this moment.

_Toto, we're definitely not in London anymore._

So, being kept out of the way. Having to be visited in secret. Moriarty may be dead, but everything that the man had lived and died for is still very much at large, still very much a threat to Sherlock and the people that he cares about the most.

So what am I doing here? Sherlock thinks angrily, why am I sitting, a useless vessel, able to do nothing? Inside of his mind, as Molly's footsteps recede slowly, regretfully out of the door, Sherlock thrashes, hits, punches, pulls one thousand triggers on one thousand guns in order to make the loudest noise that the human brain can even fathom; the blast of firearms the sweet song of war and Sherlock is left to lay _uselessly_ on the battle field, low enough to the ground to not be in harm's way, but always close enough to the action to be able to listen and see and maybe those sense are more figurative, but the message is still the same.

He's on his back in that field watching the gunshots dance over his head, sailing, sparkling, singing – like fireworks, he thinks idly as the smoke settles, covering him in dust, the product of someone's best laid plans made to waste away in a vacant world.

Boom. Bang. Fireworks.

Fireworks, Sherlock has always liked fireworks.

"Mummy would have loved these, don't you think?" Mycroft muses quietly, only a mere teenager, but so painfully familiar with the tragedy of loss and the heavy burden of too much knowledge. Sherlock considers snapping back something cold or derisive, but a voice inside of him advises him to take an alternative route.

"Yes," The younger boy finally says, and his brother offers a small nod, thankful, "I think she would have enjoyed this."

Letting off fireworks in an empty field on a certain anniversary of their mother's death is, to Sherlock (although he will never admit it) one of his fondest memories, one that he can live in for a very long time, bury himself in; it is a memory in which he can curl up like a fist protesting death, purgatory, sickness, and James Moriarty. In here, in this life, this black hole of his mind in which no time exists, memories grow and reproduce and are fostered by nothing if not a tenacious sense of humanity that has plagued him ever since his beginning – where his biggest problem is why did Mummy leave us and How will I make it through University without Mycroft and How will I live on my own and How will I _live_?

Sherlock gratefully inhales the residue left behind by the beautiful explosives, more beautiful than any star, vibrant, colorful, pirouetting gracefully in the sky of this place that transcends any semblance of chronology, where he's anxious about all of these things as a young man although simultaneously old enough to know that it is all insignificant, menial, transport.

Sparks of color perforate the stagnant melancholia of the night sky, light gray remnants still visible for minutes after they do their routines and dissipate into non-existence. Sherlock stares, mesmerized, _happy_ , of all things, and why couldn't the world end here instead of all the way out in the middle of nowhere in a treacherous, black silence?

"Huh, strange. I don't think I've ever seen you like this," A voice murmurs and Sherlock looks and John looks back and they're in the same field although it's so many years later, everything existing outside of this moment reverted to such…

"Seen me like what?"

"With your mouth shut. For so long, no less." John smiles wryly and Sherlock appreciates this, appreciates that someone as ordinary and boring and safe as John Watson would greet his insanity, his coldness, his gaping holes with a gesture as simple as an upturned quirk of the lips.

John's eyes glint slightly in the light offered by the fireworks, and they crinkle at the edges like the corners of an old photograph. Yes, the smile is sincere.

Good, then.

Sherlock turns up the collar on his coat and attempts to hide the redness creeping up his neck. "I'm assuming that I should take that kindly, albeit with a grain of salt, considering that you're not with me every second of every day." A glance at his friend brings him to the conclusion that he remains light-hearted, unfazed by the detective's efforts at being nonchalant, even distant.

"I can assure you," Sherlock continues despite himself, "that I am perfectly capable of shutting up without aid, especially aid that's so expensive and indicative of a certain immaturity."

John raises an eyebrow, "I thought that this was a special occasion." Sherlock merely smiles, big, bright, and maybe he's seeing stars because the more aesthetically pleasing light display has disappeared or because he's here with the most important person remembering his most important memory.

"Yes," He says simply after a pregnant pause, "it's very special indeed."


	4. Chapter 4

Sherlock's insides are fire.

He's certain now that he's been trapped like this for several weeks, months, possibly. He counts the past 36 days assuming that Molly comes to tend to his useless remains every four, and everything inside of him is aching for movement of any kind, aching to fight and to run all over London and to spout rude comments at the crap telly that John sometimes engages in. It's all so _simple_ , he always remarks with condescension coming off his voice in waves and John tells him to shut up but offers no defense, so Sherlock grins in silent victory.

He wants that again, wants to feel himself move, feel his voice come out of his throat, feel anything other than damp air on his skin and a thin sheet which still covers his increasingly disappointing body. There's a fire inside of Sherlock that laps at his insides, engulfs all rational thought, a fire that can only be satiated by indulgence in his senses, to Hear his brother's snide remarks Touch the strings on his violin Taste the coffee Molly used to make him all the time See the lights of his city and John and John's crap telly and John's smile and the books he's never read piled up in the flat and Lestrade's fatherly exasperation and the embarrassment on Anderson's face when he does, well, anything.

The truth is that Sherlock has taken all of these things for granted, all of the ridiculous nuances of life that he had so vehemently proclaimed unnecessary. They're gone, simply gone, and Sherlock now finds himself powerless and fearful in the face of never being able to experience them again.

36 days at the very least, in his own skewed perception of time, with no more stimulants to his brain than the deafening silence and the chaos of his own memories.

Molly visits again that afternoon, while Sherlock is stuck counting the minutes in lieu of torturing himself further with heightened nostalgia. She changes whatever bags that he has hooked up to him, brushes the hair out of his eyes (growing long, needs a cut), and stands still for minutes on end. Talking, Sherlock figures, if he goes by the gentle switch of weight distribution between her feet, each time she sways sending vibrations through the room that sound to Sherlock like nothing short of gunfire.

He begs any higher power that might exist (John would spare a chuckle) to let him know what she's saying, let him hear anything, anything other than his own voice echoing noiselessly in the hollow corridors of his mind.

As it happens, he doesn't get a response.

Instead of waiting, then, he begins to focus all of his energy into one of the more simple movements, hoping that if he can accomplish this one feat, then the rest of the road to recovery could be well within reach: The movement of a small index finger, something that could break down barriers, something that could reinstall him as king over his own body.

Severe neural damage, damage to the spine to cause the paralysis, loss of control, that's what he's been able to gather from all of his misspent time here.

Thus, he has a fine goal, to be sure.

*

Sherlock never used to dream. Before the Fall, he would hardly even sleep, not unless it was absolutely necessary or if John would coerce him into like only the ex-army doctor had the ability to do. Now, though, dreaming is his only option, the only instance in which he can experience sensation; sight, sound, genuine warmth.

He appreciates it in a strange way, even if thus far these visions are only memories. What he does not appreciate, however, is that instead of the mutually beneficial opposite of this situation, Sherlock has become a slave to his own mind, dangerously quick, capricious, and currently on a self-destructive binge.

"Hey you," He hears suddenly and he whips around and _oh no_ he remembers this, remembers this feeling of DreadAnxietyShameFear…

He can't move now, not even in his mind. Powerless.

"Hey. Are you alright? You don't look too good."

Sherlock has only been at university for three months at this point, away from everything mundane in the comforting sense, away from his room and his brother and father and he's stuck in a whole town made of gray boxes, gray faces, and an omniscient fog which seeps beneath Sherlock's skin and makes him itch.

Everything is so _boring_ , he can't help but think, a repetitive mantra, and the quiet murmurs of irrelevant things, the insipid chatter is enough to drive him mad any why does he need any of this How will it help Why does it matter? In class, his fingers dance all over, spidery ligaments longing to be typing or tracing or lighting a cigarette or texting or bloody _anything_ but taking notes verbatim about people who mean nothing, events, places, books, charts, phrases that mean nothing and this world is just one large box full of _nothing_ , why couldn't anyone see that?

"Hey. Is anyone there? Hello?"

Sherlock starts to take the drugs because he just wants to see the world in color again. He just wants that and is that so much to ask when he's so far from home, from London, from everything that means anything?

Soon, the cigarettes aren't enough, and with each passing day it takes more and more for Sherlock to ease his pain, sickness, utter disdain at the greyscale in which he's being forced to live. Marijuana is dubbed useless, having essentially the opposite effect that he's looking for; heroine only gives him a dull buzzing in his head and a bad taste in his mouth the next day; speed helps for a little while, but only for a short time when he ceases to be satisfied with the height that he's taken to.

Cocaine is the thing that wakes up, keeps him standing, keeps him from screaming and snapping and ultimately keeps him in its debt. Unforgiving. Unfortunate.

As it happens, it becomes even more unfortunate when Sherlock loses his control over it, his seemingly symbiotic relationship with the stimulant rocketing completely out of his grip.

Presenting, Sherlock Holmes: Human being.

He doesn't realize it when any semblance of dignity slips through his fingers, and so he's left to ponder over it as he collapses onto the pavement right outside of the murderer's apartment. His thoughts are working slowly, doggedly, making as much progress as he can imagine making whilst running under water; his deductions muddled by the raw need and pain of relapse coursing through his veins.

How long as it been?

 _Must have been two weeks,_ he tries, attempting to crawl over the rubble of his mind _, two weeks plus a few hours NEED MORE right after that last fix NEED MORE normally case work helps but it's been a while NOW god when did I get so damn far in over my head?_

Everything is spinning now, he can hear the cries of someone far away, and is this all a carefully constructed figment of his imagination? Is this what death feels like? If so, it's not completely unpleasant, and he's grateful for that.

Briefly, before his eyes close, Sherlock catches glimpses of flashing lights, white at first but then melting into a stunning, burning, splitting red.

And the _noise_ , won't somebody _please_ for the love of all things that remain sacred, stop the goddamn ringing?

This is how Sherlock Holmes meets detective Gregory Lestrade of the renowned Scotland Yard.

"You," He says when Sherlock wakes up in the hospital. The detective looks much younger than he does even a year after the encounter, lacking the creases that he accumulates on his forehead the way that someone will fold a receipt out of nervousness or of deep concentration. His eyes are brightest just before the dusk of his life that he will soon find himself in, and to Sherlock, he is a guardian angel.

Everything is still blurred, colors shimmering or maybe it's just Sherlock's eyes, and most if not all of the noises – the earsplitting _noises_ – are fuddled, difficult to distinguish from one another.

Who are you, Lestrade Greg what, where? It's the first thing that he asks, followed by a steady stream of other questions after Sherlock can't find the words to respond, questions like Where did you come from Why are you here What are you on Why the hell were you near my case?

Who told you what you know?

What are you connections?

But the most insistent question, the question asked with the most fervor,

Do you have a place to stay tonight?

If Sherlock had the ability to summon the use of his vocal chords, he might have laughed, and the then-detective was young and rather naïve, so he may have laughed along with him.

What is meant to come off as a chuckle comes out a broken, "It doesn't matter", followed by a look that passes between the two young men, a sort of acquiescence to the inevitability of the conundrum that they are beginning to find themselves in: either Sherlock comes home with the older man, tells him everything he knows, kicks his drug habit and works with him in the Yard, or Sherlock keeps his pride, loses the rest, and spends the remainder of his life deducing all of the invigorating affairs in his prison cell.

"Let's try this one more time," Lestrade says quietly, the first creases of adulthood beginning to show on his face, "Do you have a place to stay tonight?"

Sherlock swallows his pride, makes a note of how bitter it tastes going down his throat and mumbles, "Only if you would be so inclined to give me one, detective."

*

That night, after Sherlock walks into Lestrade's apartment and prevents himself from telling the story of adultery that his girlfriend is already living, the detective gets a call from Mycroft.

Dear big brother, Sherlock thinks with overtones of malice coming from his internal voice, not concerned enough to intervene in the affairs of his dreadful sibling's life, although not above giving a good-natured phone call to those who are?

Delightful.

The young Sherlock Holmes solves the first case the next day in a matter of hours, and is too enthralled by the rush of victory that he experiences to take any credit for it. In a matter of a couple of years, detective Lestrade becomes Detective Inspector Lestrade, and Sherlock only falls off the wagon once, the fourteen hours that follow being perhaps the most unpleasant of his entire life.

That is, of course, until his present situation, but he'd rather not think about that at this moment, thank you.

The portrait in his mind brightens, dims, then fades completely and Sherlock once again finds himself in folds of impenetrable darkness.

No such luck.

And what is Lestrade doing now? He asks himself after readjusting to the here and now. His mind is riddled with questions, and he gets the strange, sudden, neigh overpowering desire to get to know his friend all over again; Greg who found him, Greg who saved him, Greg who set him free. Does he know I'm alive? Has he left his wife, has he left the Yard, has Big Brother put him under his wing to protect him from the Moriarty under his bed?

Sherlock is overcome with emotion, knocked over by unexpected waves of gratitude. He feels a swelling in his chest and suddenly the light breeze playing in from the window on the north side of the room isn't enough, only serves to fan the fires of impassioned turmoil in which he is now engulfed for the umpteenth time.

He'll never again have a chance to say thank you or I'm sorry or please forgive what I've done. Sherlock despises apologies, thinks most of human interaction needless, tedious, but there aren't enough words in all of the books in the universe in order to depict how much he would like to hear slews of sorry, messy vocabulary roll off his tongue and to spend the rest of his days in menial conversation with his old friend and standing in the rain with John hearing him comment about nothing in particular – something that would have been obnoxious mere months ago, but now so glorious.

How the times have changed indeed.


	5. Chapter 5

More time has elapsed, but Sherlock can't be bothered to count anymore. Molly's visits maintain the same increment, same everything, same routines, touches, the same painful silence that plagues the detective's mind as she stands there and speaks to him, her words falling – literally – upon deaf ears, much to the chagrin and lucid misery of the would-be listener.

Months, years, lifetimes, what does it matter at this point? He thinks, because with each minute that passes, he grows more and more weary of this tiresome existence, of the unrelenting memories; cruel, torturing, the product of what could really only be his mind, turned into an interactive prison cell. All of his memories become a desperate vertiginous mess, as if all rushing at once to a secret place inside of him, as if exploding, a mass attempt at dispersing, like he's running out of time. It is around this point that Sherlock begins to become pessimistic about the likelihood of his survival (declining 0.47 percent with each of Molly's visits) and starts to think more human thoughts – list making.

He remembers vaguely that Mummy had a will before she died, if only because that is how he acquired his violin and got to throw away his own, obsolete as it had become. Did she feel like this when she was approaching the end of her days, did she hear the darkness and feel the vehemence of her thoughts begin to close in like a sickness, like a grim fog, creating a new claustrophobia that had henceforth never existed?

Before, Sherlock had never minded enclosed spaces, and often had to encounter them when in the midst of a particularly invigorating case. But now his mind is closing in on him, fighting against him, bombarding him with all of the things that he tries so hard to avoid in what was once his everyday life.

Lists. Sherlock makes lists to keep his mind running lists of the important, the non-important, the things that he wishes he'd done and is glad he didn't; memories that swell within him, creating oceans, drowning the detective within himself, inventing lists like his own will, things to give away and dissect after he goes but before the pools dry up altogether.

His lists are things like colors, just to keep something organized, under control.

_Item #1, to be taken and used after the ultimate departure of Sherlock Holmes, from list 22 sector 1B:_

Red.

Sherlock sees red like he sees his first sunrise after becoming sober when he stays in his friend's flat (friend – consider rethinking the term, foreign, obtrusive). He sees the red like the glory of morning, like the strangest and most intricately beautiful thing – the subtle blending of shades, the casual iridescence, as if this was just merely a day job, something to be taken lightly. Sherlock learns to love the sky without actually knowing the ins and outs of the way it works – the first of exactly two things. The red is peaceful, calming, a memory that the detective often calls on when seeking solace from the rest of the world.

Sherlock stands at the window now, watching, but this time the colors are fading into shades of grey rather than the shimmering gold of daybreak.

Dull. And now that he can't, who will visit this memory? What's the use of having a brain like his, memories and thoughts and aspirations like his when it can all be taken away, erased at the drop of a hat – or at the graceful rustle of clothing as one soars through the air on the way to

"Falling is just like flying, only there's a more permanent–"

The next time, Sherlock sees red like rage, feels it pumping through his mess of tangled veins, sees it cloud his vision, sees it spray into the air by means of a hole through the back of Dear Jim's precious little head.

His rage melts to fear, turns to whatever colors surround him, vivid and sharp and stabbing, but the red has seeped out of him and has stained everything, won't stop flowing out of all of the world's orifices, the open wound of time itself coming to stake its claim on two young men burdened with such a weight as monotony.

And all Sherlock can think of when he hits the ground is that damn sunrise, how it felt to really feel something and he thinks of the sunrise that he won't see tomorrow or the day after that or after that or even after

In that moment (is this real Where am I Oh god it's starting again please make it stop) Greg comes to his side. Sherlock feels his presence but doesn't look, too absorbed by the colors blanketing the sky of his city.

"Beautiful, isn't it?"

Sherlock nods. "Yes. Thank you."

He doesn't quite know whether he's thanking his friend (yes) for the room or the sobriety or the horizon itself, but he certainly makes a quick habit of it, and soon the gratitude is pouring out of him like a boiling river.

_Item #2: Meaningless – to be disposed of promptly:_

Thank you Lestrade for the sky Thank you Molly for the coffee thank you Mrs. Hudson for the reduced rent and all of the hugs even though I didn't want them. Thank you Mycroft for something that has slipped my mind, thank you Jim for not being so bloody boring although I'm glad you're dead and all and thank you John –

Thank you John for the smiles and for talking back and all the times you've surprised me with your wit or your steady hand as you take aim from behind the barrel of a gun. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you for everything.

* * *

_Item #3:_

Sherlock doesn't cry at his mother's funeral, only surveys his surroundings with a vaguely perplexed expression. There is a whole onslaught of emotions that blanket the room like a thick fog, make it hard to breathe or think or walk or talk like a stifling heat borne of tears, sadness, grief.

Mycroft makes a speech, large wooden blocks of words carved of the young boy's profound sadness and punctuated by hitched breathing, sniffling from the audience, and the barely audible shifting of Sherlock's clothing over his skin which feels uncomfortable and sticky with sweat. The church is hot, a summer funeral, and the people are packed into their seats as if this is a large public event – possibly the worst show on Earth of one were to ask the young boy.

As it happens, though, no one _does_ ask him, and thus the slow procession of events continues.

Sherlock understands that he's meant to be a sobbing wreck over the death of his mother, but he cannot seem to muster up the emotion, all of his senses covered with

With what?

"What could possibly be preventing you from crying over Mum, Sherlock?"

Sherlock stares straight into his brother's face as he spits his inquiry; his features are twisted into a way that Sherlock finds unfamiliar, skewed with rage and incredulousness and confusion.

"You'll cry over the bloody solar system, but you won't cry over your own Mum?"

"That was a long time ago, Mycroft."

"What does it _matter_?" His shout bounces off of the empty walls of the kitchen, but as the sound echoes back to their ears, it makes more of an impression of a desperate plea than of anything else. Mycroft is visibly embarrassed, but he still doesn't stop berating his younger brother.

"She loved you, you know." The words cut into Sherlock and he has to stagger back a few steps. Mycroft lowers his voice. "It would be nice of you to show her the same basic courtesy. After everything she's done for you – protecting you when no one else would dare to go near you; treat you like a good son when all you really are is heartless."

The words stay with Sherlock, trapped in the windmill of his thoughts until –

_I will burn you, Sherlock. I will burn the heart out of you._

_I've been reliably informed that I don't have one._

"A heartless _freak!_ "

Sherlock turns away, runs, stumbles to his room. The door slams with more ferocity than he had intended, and his picture of the periodic table slides off of the wall as he sits on his bed, cradling his head in hands.

The emotion begins to stifle him again, makes his breathing ragged and the thoughts in his head all blur together, as if he is seeing the world through a veil of tears.

He sits there for hours – he knows because he counts the minutes himself. It is three hours and twenty six minutes before Mycroft walks into his room, ginger footsteps leading him to his younger brother's bedside table. He leaves a note because he knows Sherlock won't be able to hear him, anyway.

 _I'm sorry_ , it says.

Upon reading it, Sherlock crumples it up and throws it into the waste bin.

* * *

The detective never gets to see his own funeral, and that is something that dawns on him with a strange sort of melancholia.

Did Big Brother cry at my death? He thinks, and that familiar sickening twist of emotion begins to coil around him once more. Did he bother, after all these years, to put up that façade as the caring older sibling, or did he steer clear of the situation altogether, as he often does? He's never been one for the legwork, dear Mycroft.

After this many years of watching his brother attempt to make up for those two words, Sherlock finally, in that moment, finds the capacity to forgive him – something else that he'll never get to say.

The emotion soon becomes too much, and with a final, forceful push of will power, the nearly completely incapacitated Sherlock Holmes feels his left index finger make the slightest twitch.


	6. Chapter 6

For the first time in this whole desperately horrible situation, Sherlock Holmes can see the light.

Now that he has the door ajar, the detective tests his boundaries, sticks his toes in the water so to speak, and sees if anything will bite him. He sees the light at the end of the tunnel, and how glorious that light is.

Twitch. Twitch. The smallest movement, how fascinating, how it makes his brain whir, his thoughts flip, loop around each other, celebratory. If the detective could remember his first steps, he imagines that it would be an experience to liken to that; except there’s no one to be proud of him this time, no loving parents to look on with devoted admiration.

He’s still alone. No matter his accomplishments, they’re still kept inside of his own mind, and he realizes this with a stung sort of pride upon the fact that although the fanfare in his head is exuberant and colorful, the air around him remains still, with no vibrations to be felt.

Silence. Sherlock takes solace, however slightly, in the fact that although he is left deaf to the outside world, the outside world is just as deaf to him, if not more so.

But yes, yes, he thinks, this is good, very good, better than expected.

Now how will he manage to use this to his advantage?

Think. You’re still the genius here. You’re the greatest mind in the world and you’ve managed to thing your own finger out of paralysis. It’s you. Think.

Think.

Sherlock zeros in on the sensation of movement, feels the tingling of his nerves, the focus of his blood cells. He thinks himself into frenzy and for the first time in Whoknowshowlong, he is not assaulted with images of his past, but rather with something that he can equate only to ecstasy. His mind flies through scenarios and possibilities and didn’t he solve a case like this once before, isn’t there a book like this in his library? There is a way out, he finally feels the odds turn in his favor and the cool air has never been more appreciated.

The senses that have been left to him seem to sharpen – the air is piercing and his heartbeat accelerates with excitement.

The game is afoot, he thinks fondly, and the object of his current obsession is life. Life, glorious life.

Oh where is Molly Hooper when you need her? Where are John and Lestrade and Mycroft? Do they know? Are they aware? He has so many things to say, he’s had so much time to think and if he can get back into the ring for even just a moment, he’s sure that he could burn dear Jim’s whole web, light the candle with his newfound fire for living and walking and talking and breathing in fresh air or even air stained with smoke and sweat and life, life, _life_.

Why hadn’t he found this fixation before? How could he not have observed this? This wonderful, unexplainable thing that has been right in front of his nose this whole time.

The entire notion seems utterly ridiculous. Simplistic. Absolutely bloody brilliant.

But how to communicate? He thinks suddenly, and the whirlwind of excitement subsides temporarily, and perhaps this small movement isn’t the gateway to merely the rest of his body, but to the rest of the world, entire.

His finger drums with apprehension, and suddenly, it comes to him.

Tap. Tap tap tap. Tap tap.

Yes. Of course. How amazing, how simple, how _obvious_.

Such is life. Such are his new means of escaping this seemingly endless prison.

*

Sherlock has lost track of time, and thus lost track of Molly’s visits. He doesn’t remember the last time that she came, had been trying his best to tune everything out – something that he now curses himself for.

Stupid, _stupid_ , when did you become just like everyone else? When did your mind become so dull and oblivious?

An argument for another day.

So Sherlock waits, although this time with a certain anxiety, his ears (figuratively, at least) straining for something, anything (yes, certainly familiar). Everything he still has under his control is tensed, prepared. He is the predator, and his new object of prey is none other than life itself – the world’s greatest unsolved mystery left to the world’s greatest detective.

How fitting.

Sherlock, everything about him feels renewed, refreshed, ready.

What will be the first thing? He asks himself, dangerous with an unstoppable hope. Hope, the most naïve of all human feelings, now commandeering the very wheel of his thoughts. What will be the first thing you do? It asks, and Sherlock, so weary from the loneliness, so war-torn from the horrors of a timeless internal struggle, is all too eager to answer.

John, he thinks, always his first thought, I’ll talk to John, so unpredictable, such his favorite human, how will his friend react? Will he shower him with praise, look at him in amazement?

No, Sherlock decides, after all the good doctor has been through, after the inevitable hardening of his heart, he is 400 percent more likely over any of those things to punch the detective square in the mouth.

“Stupid bloody wanker,” He says, and suddenly Sherlock is swept up in the turbulence of yet another memory – different from all the others, however. This is a memory that hasn’t happened yet, but Sherlock, in all of his newfound optimism, is certain that it will happen. It must. It has to.

John looks at him when he shows up at Baker Street; looks right through him, possibly, but Sherlock doesn’t mind because he’s missed it missed the vacant stares and how almost nothing that makes sense to him makes sense to his friend. And perhaps that’s where the true beauty of the whole ordeal lies – in the fact that these two people understand close to nothing about each other but still remain the world, the universe, and everything.

“Hello, John.”

John’s mouth falls open slightly and his eyes fill up with a stream of tears, none of which will fall.  The detective smiles the crooked grin he reserves especially for his friend and says nothing more.

John mutters, eventually, “How long?” After which Sherlock brushes past him and up the stairs, taking them two at a time, leaving the doctor on the doorstep to process the information.

“Sher…Sherlock?”

John thinks he’s hallucinating – it wouldn’t be the first time. He follows Sherlock into the flat and watches him rifle through all of his old things.

“You kept it,” Sherlock says.

“What?”

“Everything.”

“What?”

The doctor is almost entirely speechless, and Sherlock uses his stillness to view him properly. His eyes sweep John’s profile, his first deduction back on the job, and it comes down to a mere five words:

“It’s been a long time.”

The most prominent difference is that John is wearing a wedding ring – married? Sherlock feels an inexplicable pang of hurt, another wound to bury under his skin, to let heal. Emotions. Dull. He looks past it.

John’s eyes are still the same stunning shade of blue, so soft around the edges. They’ve grown cold, though, Sherlock notices, harder to melt into that wide eyed enthrallment that the detective had inspired upon their first meeting and infinite times afterwards.

John has no laugh lines, only shadows of insincere smiles, attempting to hide a deeper, darker shade of indigo.

Above all these things, though, Sherlock notices the grief. John Watson, his friend, his best friend – John has grief like a tired soul, like a lonely color caught between the shades of his lost sunrise. He has grief like a flower has pedals, his resistance slowly falling off as time passes doggedly by. Sherlock sees his friend’s sorrow, and it looks like long nights spent alone in an empty flat while he tells his wife that he’s working late at the clinic. It looks like every shadow causing a double take and the loss of faith in not only the world around him, but in himself.

How could I not have seen? The doctor has asked himself. John’s grief looks like guilt, and already, without having seen it, it hurts Sherlock more than a head full of pavement, more than cracking skulls or broken nerves, spines, tearing skin or countless nights sitting useless in a gurney.

And that’s when it will come, after Sherlock nearly drowns in the flat, and not for the first time.

John will punch him in the mouth, hard enough to knock him out, and when the detective wakes up, again, the first thing he sees will be a brilliant smile, better than all the colors of dawn from all the views in London.

“Welcome back, Sherlock.”

*

Three short, three long, three short. Over and over again Sherlock taps and taps and taps and waits and taps and shouldn’t Molly have been here already? Shouldn’t he have already felt the vibrations of her cautious footsteps, already felt her scream of fear and astonishment and delight carry through the room?

Short short short. Long, long, long. Short, short –

It’s only a short time after the Discovery that he finally feels a presence, and he nearly begins to tap his heartbeat instead. Three short three long three short _SOS Help Molly Please I’m So Close You Have To Help._ Just a little bit farther now, just a little bit more to wait until she’ll notice and she’ll figure it out and then –

He can almost see the reaction when the footsteps, oh so _brilliant_ stop abruptly. Sherlock continues tapping madly. _SOS. SOS. SOS. SOS._ The air trembles with the tension. He can almost see Molly drop her clipboard, her eyes going wide legs weak breath catching how can it be possible? How can this be happening? He longs to hear her for not the first time, cry his name in a disbelieving tone, Sherlock? Can you hear me?

No.

Listen.

Short-short-short. Long-long-long. Short-short-short.

_SOS._

And it takes her a while (longer than it would have taken _him_ , certainly) and then it’s all put on fast-forward, like a gale sweeping through the room and making an adversary of Time, like he can’t concentrate enough to count the minutes from when she runs out of the rom and when she comes back with two more pairs of footsteps and his heart is racing and he can’t stop tapping _SOS SOS SOS_ he’s so close would someone please just

_What do you want?_

The taps are slow, painfully; played out cautiously on his chest by a finger that is definitely not the slender form of Molly’s no this is a person – a man – who knows what they’re doing and what they’re saying and _oh god, could it be?_ And Sherlock can just barely make out the words, slowly, slowly over the rapturous beating of his own heart. _What do you want?_

But wait.

Everything stops.

What does he _want_? There’s a moment of pause, of dreaded silence before the detective begins again, with the finger replaced with a palm, a weight on his chest that tremors slightly with the anticipation. Careful now, pay attention.

_Help me._ Following his plea, Sherlock can very nearly feel the crack in the atmosphere that seems to suck all of the air out of the room. Suddenly there’s not enough of it to breathe. The hand is connected to a body that sits down beside him on his bed and curls a shaking fist in his gown. He’s in pain.

Silence. There’s nothing there. If it wasn’t for the undeniable presence beside him, Sherlock would have thought it all a dream, thought he had already woken up and found himself, once again, alone.

He waits. And waits.

When he can’t wait any longer, he taps again. _John?_

The reply comes quickly, forcefully and deliberately on Sherlock’s chest, accompanied by drops of moisture that he can’t quite place a name to; unfamiliar and worrying and oh god no this is the first this has ever occurred to him please no but what if they –

_Sherlock. We can’t._


	7. Chapter 7

_**A/N** :_ **This is it, more or less. There will be a short epilogue posted later today. Thank you all so much, those of you who read, for sticking with this the whole time. I know that it was a slow process, although I sincerely hope that you took at least some enjoyment out of it.** _  
_

* * *

 _We can't_. The words ring. They're ringing. They're an assault on Sherlock's senses and his limbs freeze and he can't concentrate on anything but all of the hopes that were spinning around and around, and how they're all flying straight out the back of his head. He can feel them ripping him at the seams and his breathing may or may not stop.

 _Sherlock_.

No, no, no, no. Sherlock hadn't thought of this. It's impossible. He still can't think of it for that simple reason, because _it's impossible_. He feels a new, desperate heat coil inside of his chest and all he wants to do is scream to let it out to tell them all that they're _wrong_ he's waited so long and he's tried so hard and he doesn't care what they do so long as they _do it_ it doesn't matter if it hurts because at least he'll be alive and anything but –

_Sherlock._

And then suddenly he's exhausted. Of course. He's become dull. The heat turns to cold, cold like the hatred he now feels for himself for losing himself _within himself_ and he's sinking now, how could he not have –? Of course. Of course, of course. How could he be so naïve? Indulging his idiotic pride and planning a way out of this, when maybe all that he should have been planning was how to say goodbye.

_Sherlock. Come back._

But he's too far gone for that.

* * *

John Watson hasn't seen his best friend in over a year, having, of course, assumed he was dead the whole time. He saw the Fall, he saw everything, and he's been haunted by it ever since. So, needless to say, when he received a call from Molly Hooper down at Bart's that he needs to see something _now_ because _John, Sherlock, he's alive_ , well, he was surprised.

To say the least.

He was also angry.

"Well why the fuck am I the last to know?"

"John, I'm sorry, we just thought it was best that…"

"Save it. I'll be right there."

So here he is. The basement is cold and damp - he didn't even know it had a basement - and his footsteps echo ominously throughout the unfinished halls. It's too quiet. Sherlock would hate it. Molly and Mycroft have already tried and failed too many times to talk to him to think now that he would respond. He's suffered for what seems like a thousand years beneath weights of heavy guilt and misery, and they knew the whole time. He thinks petulantly, _They should have said something. I don't care what state he's in. I know how to take care of him, and they don't_.

Although he'll have to admit, whatever he was expecting beforehand, it sure as hell wasn't _this_.

* * *

John, John, John. John, please. John, help, John, Please Help I Want To Get Out Of Here Please I'm Begging You To Find A Way.

I'm So Sorry For My Arrogance And All The Times I Made You Feel Like Less Than You Were.

Sherlock can feel himself drowning again, maybe for the last time. John's hand is still caught in his gown and he's shaking and if Sherlock could, he knows he would be crying and there's nothing more to say about that because he _can't_ and so nobody has to see him Fall all over again. Especially not John.

 _Come back_ , come the weak taps. _Stay calm._ There's another pause, and he can feel John's breathing as it goes through the stages of Sherlock's own succession of thoughts; first ragged, then calm, then frenzied and then…resigned?

He poses the question on Sherlock's chest a different way, and the detective lets the words seep into him completely:

 _What do you_ need _?_

* * *

"Okay. Explain."

Sherlock is lying prone on a hospital bed, nearly every inch of him covered in bandages. The monitor beside him is beeping at an ever increasing pace, and the doctor stops in his tracks and turns to Molly and Mycroft when he says it.

 _Explain_.

He doesn't really know why he asked. The words all fly over him instantaneously; words like "comatose" and "nerve damaged" and "paralyzed" and well then what's the point?

"Then why have you brought me here?" The two opposite him pass a look between themselves like a secret just waiting to be let out. John balls his fists at his side and takes a deep breath. "Is there even any hope?"

The air really is sucked out of the room. He thinks, maybe Sherlock can feel that too. Maybe he knows what's coming. Mycroft is the one that says it, but the words become muffled as his worst fears are all at once confirmed.

"We want you to be the one to let him go, John."

"Let…him…"

"John, there is no hope. We thought you would like the chance to…to say goodbye."

Molly adds quietly, "For real this time."

* * *

What does he _need_. Well, isn't that a question for the ages. He _needs_ a lot of things – he _needs_ to get out of his head and to get back in the flat and to solve more cases and feel the cold London air cut into his lungs as he goes about doing just that. He needs to see again, to see John and Mrs. Hudson and maybe even Mycroft, too. He needs to thank Molly. He needs to be able to tell whether or not he's dreaming or just…

No.

What does he… _need_? He wants all those things to be sure, he wants them with all of his heart, but. Oh, John, always the clever one. In so many ways, he was always the truly clever one of the two, wasn't he? Too clever for Sherlock. The question went straight over his head, but now he understands.

What does he _need?_ He needs to get away. If he can't have what he wants, he has to settle for necessity. Without the prospect of life, what else is there to turn to? The gears of his mind finally slow down to a steady amble as he begins to see it all at once. He never thought he would live forever, did he?

He needs to let go. He's scared and his heart is quivering and now John's forehead is a warm weight on his chest and he's gotten this far and he needs to let go.

He taps wearily, and waits for a reply.

* * *

"That's what you brought me here for?" There are tears in Molly's eyes, and she wipes them with the sleeve of her coat while Mycroft stands stoic beside her. He sighs deeply, and the slight shaking in his voice betrays his expression.

"I'm sorry. We just thought, since you didn't get a chance before, and since you _were_ his best friend –"

"Am."

"I'm sorry?"

"I _am_ his best friend." Mycroft stares at him a long while before sighing again.

"Yes. Apologies."

John still can't quite take in the sight of Sherlock on the bed. All that's left visible and not obstructed by gowns and bandages are his closed eyes and some unruly tufts of hair. There are some slivers of skin that he can see among the forest of white, but John isn't sure he'd recognize him if he weren't here being told that he has to watch him die all over again.

"We had to clean him up a bit before you got here," he can hear Molly say between soft sobs. "Because it would have…it would have been a lot."

John nods once, quickly, which seems to signify that he's on board with this whole terrible ordeal, even though he's not. He could never say goodbye to Sherlock; not really. He'll deal with the ghosts and the nightmares – and he's sure that he'll be seeing this particular nightmare a lot – but it would be worth it, if he could just hear his friend's voice.

Mycroft says, "We need you to make him come to his own conclusion. He'll never accept it if he thinks that it's being forced upon him." John can tell that he's trying his best to detach himself from the situation, although he's not doing a very good job. It makes him respect the elder Holmes a little bit more. The doctor nods again.

"How do you think I'll do that?" He sees Sherlock's fingers begin to twitch and he jumps and looks towards his counterparts. Molly sees what he sees, but only shakes her head. He understands; don't get your hopes up. It doesn't mean anything. What little he had left keeping him upright deflates.

"We figure you'll think of something."

Sherlock taps rapidly, _SOS, SOS, SOS._ Yeah, John knows the feeling. He walks over and swallows thickly, and his hand shakes as he extends it, places it on the detective's chest. His mind bends.

 _Sherlock_?

* * *

He figures to himself, this is it. There's silence, and then he can almost see John's face crumple all over again as the tears begin to spill. He's scared. They're both scared, but Sherlock can't even show it; cannot give his friend the last moment that he really deserves. Again.

 _Okay,_ John taps. Sherlock wants to burn down this barrier between the two of them, but it's his own body, so he can't. He wants to burn it all. He wants to burn all the things he's never said and all the actions that he's regretted and John, oh John, he supposes this will be his last chance to say it, so he does, and –

 _John, I love you_. John, I always have, somewhere, _John_ , you're the only one who's put up with me and who's laughed _with_ and not _at_ and thank you for everything and I'm sorry and goodbye and _I love you_.

It seems to take the last wind out of him, these words. And with that, he lets the darkness swallow him for one final time.

 _Goodbye_.

* * *

"Has he answered?"

 _Let me go_ , Sherlock says.

"Yes."

"Has he said it?"

 _Let me go_.

"Yes." Mycroft exhales, and the breath rattles out of him like something profane. Molly breaks down into more hysterics, and has to press her forehead to the wall. Mycroft steps forward as John lays his own head on Sherlock's chest and starts to whisper something he cannot remember; unintelligible. Maybe apologies, maybe confessions, maybe some of both. He'll never know.

Mycroft hesitates before doing it, and he shares more last words that John can't hear over the beating of his own heart.

He takes the syringe, and pumps it into one of Sherlock's many winding tubes, and that's when John feels it.

 _John, I love you_. Oh, Sherlock, he knows. He lets out a single choked cry as the flat line rings, and then is silent. Sherlock is gone.

 _I know_ , he taps, _I love you too_ , but it's too late. Sherlock Holmes has left the building.


End file.
